New Member and Beginner to Astronomy

A hearty welcome Raymond, just point that C6 on the planet Saturn (now rising in the eastern sky at about 9pm) and you will be converted over to the dark side !

Keith..

Yes il 2nd that by Keith...once you catch Saturn its all unsocialible hours of fun....freezing...aukward positions...and head scratching as a newbie!!!!!!! and being late for work in the mornings :lol:

Welcome Raymond!
Don't listen to Dave L!
Look through as many big scopes as you can!
Get the fever!!
It's beautiful!


My wife is a nuts as I am,
She constantly says stuff like...
'Shur just go buy the goddamed one scope that'll do you for a lifetime
and be done with it!''

I really don't think she knows the score.
God I never hope she does.
'else our kids will go shoe less.....

Hi Raymond. I'm a newbie too. I bought a 90mm (3.5") refractor scope at the end of Nov 2007..........................i got my hands on "Turn Left At Orion" a week ago and it appears to be a BIBLE for small scopes.

Already i have been bitten by apeture fever and plan to upgrade to 8" ASAP.

Hello everybody and many thanks for all the replies. The advice about the aperture fever is bang on! Many thanks for all the encouragement, and yes I think Saturn will be one of the first things I will try to observe. I saw a lovely view of Saturn about 2 weeks ago, it rose just above the sea, I was standing North of Clogherhead with the Meade Telescope. Actually on the same night I hand held a digital camera on to the front of the lens and even though my hands were shaken I took some pictures of the moon and Mars which surprised me. On that note I think that in the future whenever I learn a bit more I would probably try my hand at astrophotgraphy and imaging. I would like to ask you guys if the Neximage Solar System Imager is any good or if anyone actually has it, and how they're getting on.

Answering to Jeff, yes I am still in Drogheda, not far from Martello tower.

Many thanks again, all the best

Raymond.[/list]